I didn’t just fight Bayce that day. Everyone was dueling everyone!
Chora came down from the cabin roof and demonstrated Lyen-Chunst moves that she considered to be “on the easier side.” I followed along as best I could, shortly before engaging in a match with her. We swayed, pirouetted, and swerved, and just as I felt the stiffness of the forms starting to melt into something like the ease of wind…she grabbed me and flipped me on my nekomata back.
Then Heidschi went over their own powers. I already knew that depending on the rhythm of their drum, they could heal or strengthen countless sheep. What I didn’t know was that anyone in Heidschi’s “party” could get the same benefits. Also new to me were the telescoping drumstick-javelins that could also be supercharged by the music.
As Bayce and Chora swapped tips about elemental strategy, Reed and I decided to take on Heidschi’s little army. Seven sheep, armed with arcing energy horns that reminded me of the capricorn-like gackerns, stared us down, guided by a thunderous drumbeat.
Reed and I stood side by side. She whistled.
Yes, I agreed. We had some pretty impressive enemies before us…
Oh no, wait. She was using one of those signals we’d made together, wasn’t she. One of the signals I mostly forgot and scribbled down badly in my notes.
Frantically I checked the old notes in my System:
image [https://jmassat.com/wp-content/Catgirl%20System/Map/Map131-1.png]
Agh! They were as bad as I remembered!
Pitifully, I meowed back. Then I realized that I shouldn’t have said anything because that could be interpreted as a signal. Darnit, we really needed to practice!
A moment later, the drums paused almost imperceptibly and the sheep charged.
Like before, I pushed myself by not using any Skills whatsoever. Reed, though, was flinging charges of pink energy from her blade—not always, but often, the shockwaves soaring into the trees. Fortunately, she didn’t try any more whistling. We fell into a wordless, meowless, whistleless routine against the sheep. Reed’s impeccable footwork and sword handling would hold them off, though their clashing horns forced her into more blocks than slashes and blasts. I, meanwhile, worked on the sidelines, watching Reed for signs of struggle so that I could come in and pick off a sheep before they got in a nasty blow.
It soon became clear that yes, of course we could overpower seven sheep—even seven deadly ones. Instead of flinging more rams at us, Heidschi changed their rhythm, and the horns disappeared. Now we had to deal with sheep coated in cream-colored aura whose eyes and mouths glowed and steamed.
Reed and I took a moment to breathe. We were scuffed, and horns had scratched our faces and limbs, but all the cuts were only skin-deep. There were smiles in our eyes.
Now the sheep were mobile flash cannons. Like lights going wild at a Hollywood debut, they flung spotlights every which way. The best defense, of course, was Reed’s blade. I practiced agility by running behind her whenever she showed signs of preparing a block. Then I jumped out, always trying to tackle a sheep from the side so they could stop bleating burning light into our faces already.
In the end, as seven sheep lay sleepily in the grass and recovered, a single drumstick javelin soared our way. Reed swatted it down with a flash of pink light.
That light…what kind of energy was it anyway?
Reed saw my curious look. As the javelin bounced to the ground, she said, “That pink aura? It’s just power and heat. I don’t have the natural talent to refine it into fire.”
What’s wrong with pure power? I thought.
Congratulations went all around. As we trained, we mixed and matched, fighting each other in different spontaneous ways and combinations. Chora was still a bit reserved, but we all shared more than a few booming laughs.
And perhaps better yet, we ironed out both plans for tomorrow and useful commands we could use if we needed to. In between showing us her sword techniques, Reed shared a few whistles with us…and when we learned for sure that Bayce, Chora and I couldn’t whistle, she made gestures and jotted down variations of “meow” instead.
…I said this was “perhaps better yet,” but would we even have a need for these tomorrow? More and more signs were pointing to “no.” Namely, our transportation. We probably wouldn’t split up and get lost as long as we had…
A car!
Yes…there were…cars, in this world? It felt wrong. It shouldn’t have, given the wacky luggage I’d seen Reed rolling, and the fact that magic could produce fire and presumably also exhaust, but, uh…yeah. At least it was made of a combination of wood and metal. No electronic headlights and none of that familiar reek of petroleum.
Instead of wheeling it out of a garage, Reed reached into that basement hatch, steadied herself, took several deep and tense breaths…and then, like a magician, pulled out a fully formed buggy!
Bayce clapped frantically, and I meowed in approval. Judging by Chora and Heidschi’s steady gazes, though, this was nothing unusual on Vencia.
The shape of the thing was somewhere between a Model T and a dune buggy. Not a single dab of paint tried to liven it up, but its natural reddish-bronzish-grayish mix gave it character. So did the dents and bruises all along the hull. Make no mistake: this brick had been sent flying. Reed had loved it and repaired it all the same.
Windshields circled the whole vehicle, several inches thick all around. It was open-top, which kind of seemed like a security oversight until I figured they could magic up the roof with a button in a flash. More importantly, though, the thing had shimmering leather seats the color of bourbon, and between them were cushioned armrests along with spaces for food, books, or cat bodies.
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And like a magic accordion, the car's length folded out before our eyes, instantly tripling the carrying capacity. This limo could carry us all, and it could fit four or five emergency sheep in the trunk!
Instead of that, though, my human friends immediately got to work opening the hatch and filling it with a combination of explosives and pool essentials.
Chora and I both stood back, squinting. Soon, she raised her voice. "Um, I wouldn't say swimsuits are a priority."
"They're not," Bayce admitted, tossing a flat beach ball inside, "but I didn't have time to make enough Giga Fire spells to fill this."
Chora blinked. I feared she might explode, but instead she turned halfway and shrugged. “As long as you leave enough space for rations.”
“Rations?!”
Heidschi threw in, “Would you consider it if we called it ‘lunch’?”
Bayce also had to be talked out of stuffing in lots of multicolored pool noodles, but it seemed clear to everyone that she was just joking. It must’ve helped that we’d had a spirit of camaraderie all day. Bayce and Chora had just shared a serious sparring match, after all—maybe that’d burned off some frustration, somewhat literally.
Soon everyone was done stuffing things in the trunk (and Bayce was done adding pool noodles to the Inventory within one of her bangles). I hopped up onto the open trunk’s edge to see beach toys in the corner and three cinnamon-charcoal bundles taking up most of the room. Each was the size of a cooler.
This really was a party.
Reed was staying silent, the better to give the buggy a look-over, open and close the doors, make sure it would work alright. As she hopped into the front seat and revved it up experimentally, Bayce hammered a fist into her palm. “We have yet to answer the most important question! What kinds of swimsuits do Taipha and Heidschi wear?!”
“Bayce?” Reed said over a popping motor. It sounded like a motherly warning.
Heidschi looked bashful, and Chora just looked relieved Bayce hadn’t aimed the question at her.
And I was…honestly a little curious about fitting in at the beach.
If everything worked out and we weren’t vine-obliterated, this would be my first time having a “day out” with people, and I didn’t wanna look like the odd one out any more than I already did, y’know? Even if my three core friends would accept me no matter what I wore—or if I wore nothing at all—I’d begun to wonder about the wider world. Even if I didn’t wanna go swimming, necessarily, I still wondered about beach fashion. And say what you will about Bayce’s overly tall shoes, she did mostly have good taste in fashion.
I shared my current swimsuit opinion: “Meow.”
This was overlooked, probably because of its utter dearth of information.
I would’ve broken out the spirit board and started spelling, but just when I thought Heidschi was too embarrassed to say anything, they murmured, “Do you have anything…frilly?”
Bayce responded by squatting by and sifting through a mess of clothing I hadn’t even seen her take from the cabin and hurl into the dirt. That pile was as big as a washing machine! So many…
“Hey! Whaddaya know. There’s like five frilly things in here. And most look like they’d fit you… More skin or less?”
Their voice quivered. “More.”
“With a top?”
“Yes.”
“Catch”—and Bayce lobbed two skimpy fabric fragments at Heidschi. Adjusting their glasses, the shepherd looked them over. They still looked kind of shamefaced to be doing this in front of others, but Chora was stretching, I didn’t care, and Reed was just too busy. Bayce, for her part, went back to the pile, looking between it and me with a pensive “hmm.”
I gave her free rein. “GIVE ME SOMETHING COOL.”
“Too vague! There’s so many styles to choose from, even just in this little pile. Half of it is ‘cool’ rather than ‘cute,’ and of that half, around half might fit you. And with half being warm colors and half being cool colors…”
“TOO CONFUSING! IM TUNING U OUT NOW”
“Okay, okay! Let’s whittle down the options. So, um, you’re a cat, and I assume you don’t like getting wet. You may not wish to relive the trauma of diving in the depths like we did just a few short days ago.”
“Meow…”
“So…what about a diving suit? That’d cover your legs and torso.”
Okay, that sounded like a bridge too far. Was she not seeing my constantly exposed shoulder and thighs? Sure, immersing myself in water was still a little uncomfortable, but likewise, wearing clothes was still a little unnatural. Too much would feel constricting. Wait, was there even such a thing as a loose-fitting swimsuit?
Seeing my hesitance, Bayce went for something different. Lo and behold, she pulled out…a swim-dress?!
After I’d studied it for a few seconds, the little dictionary in my head told me it was called a sarong. With two layers—one a typical swimsuit, the other the dress—it was maybe not exactly what I’d been hoping for, but at least part of it was free-flowing. The colors of the ensemble were black and red, with the fierce scarlet fading like sunset down to the dusky hem.
Bayce jiggled it. “You like it?” she singsonged.
I zipped into humanoid form, took the suit, and held it over myself. It looked like it just might fit! Then I took a few moments to feel and swat at the hem of the sarong. Slick swimsuit fabric was very intriguing, but it just couldn’t beat swattable hanging drapes.
“I’m, um…glad you’re having fun with that,” Bayce said. (Uh, maybe that was more than a few moments.) “Well, anyway,” she added, “let’s find out what Reed’s wearing.”
I think I would’ve been intrigued by that question if I weren’t also remembering something…something very big on my to-do list that had fallen so hard by the wayside it was practically in a gutter. I dropped the sarong and tapped Bayce on the shoulder.
She turned. “Wha?”
Poof! A hairpin fell from a cloud of steam. It fell not-so-neatly onto Bayce’s hair and was certainly not secure, but it’d hit its target, and that was something to celebrate.
Plus, the twinkling gold of the holly leaves…it really looked good with her cyan hair. I hoped she’d keep it.
Bayce’s gaze lingered on mine. I didn’t know how to react, much less what to say, and she didn’t either. The moment made me…
Holy crap, I was blushing.
For once, I knew I was blushing and I knew exactly why!
Here I was with a pretty lovely person, a gaggle of other lovely people, and a heap of clothing I knew was considered embarrassing. I myself wasn’t so much embarrassed as flustered and nervous. Holy crap, holy crap, I thought again. Did I do it wrong? What now?!
I instinctively hid my blush…behind my spirit board, and spelled out, “THIS IS JUST FOR THE DUNGEON!” Did I really need to justify the gift? Maybe not, but suddenly I was wondering how Chora felt, seeing this from afar. I mean, it’d be unfair to give one friend a gift but not another. And her eyes had to be locked on the two of us. This was a big event!
I looked over my shoulder. Chora and Heidschi had moved several paces away and were now stretching together.
I looked even further. Only Reed’s back was visible as she, no doubt, tested the pedals.
Okay, never mind.
No one else at all was looking, but the blush still hadn’t died down. I kinda worried about that.
Bayce reached over and gave me a surprisingly hard slap on the back. I jumped. “Don’t worry!” she said. “If you can walk in on me touching myself without me dying, you needn’t fear anything!”
“What?” Reed said from inside the car.
“What?” Chora said from several paces away.
Bayce huffed. “I should really stop saying stuff like that. My point is that embarrassment is natural! And it doesn’t kill people. So get embarrassed more!”
As I tried to puzzle out what she meant by all that, she took the pin in her hands, looked it over, then properly secured it and adjusted it. A hand mirror appearified in her hand. “Wow!” she cooed. “You buy this?”
Er…no. I shook my head.
“You make it?”
I shook my head.
“You found it… Oh, wow, this must be like an antique…”
With a sigh and a Morph back into cat form, I felt my flustration slip off like rolling mist. We’d had enough fun for the moment, and now I felt ready to get into serious mode again. Before we chilled out in the water, we had to, you know, help people not get killed. Chora was right to be stretching overtime.
Wind rustled the trees, like an omen.